30 Years is Better Than 385, I Guess

The government had asked for a prison sentence of 385 years for Lee Farkas, former chairman of Taylor, Bean & Whitaker Mortgage Corp., who was recently convicted in a $3 billion mortgage fraud scheme that also caused the collapse of Colonial Bank – the sixth largest bank failure in U.S. history according the FDIC lawyer Tom O’Brian (pictured below).

Reading from a prepared statement Farkas told the judge, “I believe that everyone at Taylor, Bean & Whitaker and Colonial were acting together and in good faith,” He said he had to “take risks” and the company “grew too fast”….”I thought perhaps naively that the ship could right itself.” Never once did he mention the fraud scheme.

Saying “I do not detect one bit of actual remorse that what you did was unlawful, that you engaged in fraud, ” Judge Brinkema imposed a 30 year sentence and a $38.5 million forfeiture on the 58 year-old Farkas.

Courtartist is me, Art Lien. I've been sketching the courts since 1976, and for most of that time the U.S. Supreme Court has been my regular beat. I've been working almost exclusively for NBC News since 1980.
Courtroom sketching is a form of visual journalism or reportage drawing that is slowly dying out. Where once upon a time news organization each had their own artist covering a story, today a "pool" artist often sketches for all. It is a demanding and stressful discipline where the drawing is often done directly and under tight deadline.